I’ve gotten all the way to engines running and not noticed that light.
As much as I hate to admit it in front of strangers on the internet, I have too
…after which I made a point to check for that specific light each time before I hit the start button, in addition to always taking one last little look before boarding. I also feel of my pants pocket for the aircraft key, so that I know that it isn’t hanging out of one of the nose compartment locks, ready to jiggle out and into one of the engine inlets right after rotation… (That’s never happened to me, but I’ve had one horrible moment of panic when I couldn’t recall where I put that key after I got in the cockpit…)
The 525's all have the same problem...
You wind up with cheats like “Okay, the Pitot-Static lights look like a Christmas tree, and the others are a flag at half-staff”, except that Cessna moved them around between models (and even serial numbers/service bulletins applications) so that doesn’t even work if you it in a different tail #.
If it’s any consolation, the G5000 EICAS (and every EICAS system that I am aware of) is even worse. If during cruise you see an annunciator light flash on/off out of the corner of your eye, you probably know by memory which one it is or can pull the Emer/Abnormal checklist and look at the back page to get an idea of what you’re in for. The G5000 EICAS is stuffed into a tiny box, sorted red/yellow/white, and then sorts by first-last, so they wind up a jumbled mess of annunciations that I read through and study before I know what’s going on.
The G5000 had a gremlin early on where about 1 out of 10 first flights of the day, the A/P didn’t wake up happy, and after the self-test on boot-up, you’re given an AP FAIL yellow. However, AP FAIL is normal prior to avionics on. So if you don’t catch that in that sea of ‘normal’ yellow lights, one that was normal a few minutes ago is no longer normal, you’re going to have to either shut down at the end of the runway for a few minutes, or not have an autopilot after takeoff (and no way to bring it back short of a complete power cycle).
Good idea. We always fly with two pilots, but we rotate who is in the “Captain” seat based on whether we are flying a 135 patient leg or not. Back when I was learning to fly Citations at another company about 24 years ago, I learned on the Citation II and V that if I’m sitting in the left seat, when the right seater closes and locks the door (which makes a significant sound), I should point to that very annunciator on the caution panel and say aloud “door is locked, light is out” and that was also supposed to prompt me to look at the baggage lights. Despite this, I’ve had it happen probably about four times in the last twenty years. We get in a hurry, or are fatigued, or there is a distraction at the wrong moment… Fortunately, I’ve always caught it prior to getting on the runway and hitting the pitot static system up, which turns off the rest of the lights, but would leave that one glaring unlock light…oh…that would be bad… (for those of you that don’t know…the Citations I fly…and many other planes are “dark panel” aircraft where the normal state of the panel is all lights off).
The keys are a great point. I also cringe whenever anyone puts something like an iPad or a water bottle on the leading edge of the wing…it only takes a minute of distraction to trash a million dollar engine. I’ve never left the keys in the lock either…I was always taught to remove the key and put it back immediately in your pocket (that is why so many FBO courtesy car keys end up spread all over the country ).
The previous company I worked for we had a CJ, V, and II and this happened before I came onboard, but apparently one of the nose lockers on one of the planes had been left unlocked, came open on a flight from Gastonia, NC to Greensboro (a short 15 minute hop) and a bag did fall out - and was never found. It might have been the CJ…we had one of the original ones with a single digit serial number. It had some significant teething issues in our first year of operating it.
We might need to rename this topic to “There I was…” instead of “Where you are…”
What do you haul? I haul the big fokkers, baby, yeah!
I hauled one in on my shoulder. Lifting it was no problem. Carrying… not for the first twenty meters. Those poles were about 150 pounds I reckon. My left clavicle is quite bruised now. Wrestling concrete is no fun Better to be a tool-using monkey.
Tea time for the crew. The dude with the hat and mittens in the back is the “village idiot”. Hilarious character with about six words in his vocabulary. Fascinated with us of course.
And while we were busting our nuts with this yard, the old man was playing garden gnome to a class of 4/5/6 year olds:
Yeah…I used to sing in a choir as a kid. Cantores Minores, one of the better boy choirs in Scandinavia.
While I enjoyed it and the training was top notch, the discipline was military grade and the assessments absolutely brutal considering you’re talking about children. Our choir director at the time was professor Christian Hauschild, a German who ruled the choir organisation with as much “blut und eisen” as he dared, which wasn’t a small amount.
In many ways, the real army service was more modern with its ways regarding discipline, hah.
Yep, that teacher would be for a whipping from the parents, higher ups and everyone now.
Either that or the rest of the class would be forced to sing badly to be sure to be inclusive and not leave anyone behind…
Not so in my day. Teachers were amazed I turned up half the time and were content to just let me sit at the back and draw pictures of planes just to have the tick on the attendance register
).
Better to be a tool-using monkey.
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